On the last day of my junior year in high school, a girl who, to me, was the prettiest girl in the school, asked me to kiss her, giving me the option to kiss her on the mouth or the cheek. I kissed her on the cheek as I was too shy to kiss her on th mouth. I had no idea what she was up to because she seemed genuinely nice about it (I had dealt with years of teasing from girls) but I "knew" she had to have some ulterior motive. She had flirted with me in the past, but was the sort of person I always felt was out of my league and so I never had a crush on her.
Thirty years later, talking to a mutual friend, he mentioned that this girl had a crush on me in high school. At first I doubted his claim, but looking back; she signed my yearbook with her phone number and a comment asking me to call her that summer, her flirting with me was anything from casual to sexually provocative. I guess the last thing that convinced me was I saw a photograph of her husband recently. He looks a lot like me. I'm guessing I just fit a look that appeals to her.
The things is, so many people here consider themselves un-loveable. I certainly did back then. I was convinced I was ugly and so grossly unappealing that women naturally wanted to avoid me. Apparently it was all in my head. Over the years, I have discovered with some amazement that some women have felt I was attractive although I have been absolutely convinced I was not.
My suggestion to people here: stop assuming you know what people think of you. Rely on their actions, not on your assumptions to guess what they might actually feel.
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Never let the weeds get higher than the garden,
Always keep a sapphire in your mind.
(Tom Waits "Get Behind the Mule")